The prevalence of autism is increasing at an alarming rate and is now considered to affect 1 in 68 children. Though autism occurs across a vast spectrum, many with the disorder experience challenges in communication and socialization; individuals with ASD think; process; communicate; interact; behave; learn; and experience the world in a variety of ways. As a result, self-guided visits to the museum may cause great stress or anxiety for both the individual and the adults accompanying him.

Numerous studies have shown the positive impact iPads have had as communication devices and accessibility resources, helping to engage the user in meaningful and individualized ways. I write to propose a Walters-specific app for visitors with Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) and Sensory Processing Disorders (SPD). This digital, mobile resource would help prepare first-time visitors; reacquaint returning visitors; enable visitors to tailor museum experiences to meet individual needs; guide visitors through museum galleries in sensory-friendly ways; and ultimately build visitor confidence.

The prevalence of autism is increasing at an alarming rate and is now considered to affect 1 in 68 children. Though autism occurs across a vast spectrum, many with the disorder experience challenges in communication and socialization; individuals with ASD think; process; communicate; interact; behave; learn; and experience the world in a variety of ways. As a result, self-guided visits to the museum may cause great stress or anxiety for both the individual and the adults accompanying him.

Numerous studies have shown the positive impact iPads have had as communication devices and accessibility resources, helping to engage the user in…

My idea is for an app that would ask the visitor a number of questions to determine their mood on that particular day. The app would then suggest 5 art works to address that emotional state. Perhaps it would also be possible to suggest a piece of music to go along with each object? This is a variant on the project linked below:

If we could apply facial recognition technology to works of art in our collection, I think very interesting "match ups" or works with similar features would emerge across really broad groups of artworks. Perhaps we could build out a "see also" tour, or some kind of app that facilitates "if you like this artwork, check out this similar work".

There are apps (like Moves) which automatically construct a timeline of your day—where you went, how long you spent there, what path you took. It would be neat to have something similar after a museum visit. That would free you to focus on the physical artworks during the visit. But afterwards an automatically constructed timeline would recall what you saw, highlighting what you spent most time looking at, and what path you took through the museum floor plan. The timeline should include photos of each artwork, a hypertexted museum label, how long you spent looking at it. The app should make it easy to share an artwork with friends and to delve deeper into a work which interested you, or to reread a detail from a museum label you forgot or didn’t quite grok at the time. Perhaps one could even send a curator a follow-up question!

There are apps (like Moves) which automatically construct a timeline of your day—where you went, how long you spent there, what path you took. It would be neat to have something similar after a museum visit. That would free you to focus on the physical artworks during the visit. But afterwards an automatically constructed timeline would recall what you saw, highlighting what you spent most time looking at, and what path you took through the museum floor plan. The timeline should include photos of each artwork, a hypertexted museum label, how long you spent looking at it. The app should…

The metadata for some of the paintings in the collection of the Walters Art Museum have been imported to Wikidata. Wikidata is the newest project of Wikimedia. Wikidata is a free linked database that can be read and edited by both humans and machines. Wikidata acts as central storage for the structured data of its Wikimedia sister projects including Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikisource, and others. On Wikidata we started the project sum of all paintings with the goal to get an item for every painting in the collection of a museum.

The metadata for some of the paintings in the collection of the Walters Art Museum have been imported to Wikidata. Wikidata is the newest project of Wikimedia. Wikidata is a free linked database that can be read and edited by both humans and machines. Wikidata acts as central storage for the structured data of its Wikimedia sister projects including Wikipedia, Wikivoyage, Wikisource, and others. On Wikidata we started the project sum of all paintings with the goal to get an item for every painting in the collection of a museum.

Radio Frequency Identification tags on objects could:
-Expand the visitor experience in a more dynamic way than standard labels or even scanned codes like QR. The object could actively transmit information when near a reader, instead of a user having to seek out the information.
-Improve security by having objects transmit their location. The inventory and security check process would be much faster and much more reliable than a solely visual one.
-Help preserve art in a more detailed and manageable way through a real time recording and reporting of climate (temp and humidity).
-Much cooler, complex, or still-to-be-developed ways I haven't thought of!

Radio Frequency Identification tags on objects could:
-Expand the visitor experience in a more dynamic way than standard labels or even scanned codes like QR. The object could actively transmit information when near a reader, instead of a user having to seek out the information.
-Improve security by having objects transmit their location. The inventory and security check process would be much faster and much more reliable than a solely visual one.
-Help preserve art in a more detailed and manageable way through a real time recording and reporting of climate (temp and humidity).
-Much cooler, complex, or still-to-be-developed ways…

Museums are constantly searching for methods to make visitor experience more enriching and engaging, and part of that process is learning what audiences want, how audiences operate in the museum, and how the museum experience is perceived by the public. Is there a new method of getting visitor feedback that hasn't been discovered and can help build on information learned through comment books, market research and interviews? What is it really like for visitors to come to the Walters? Can we expand on current methods of research such as question and answer, surveys etc -- perhaps even move beyond the primacy of text as a mode of response?

Maybe the answer could be an app that unites the interactivity of a game platform with the research methodologies of a medical assessment tool, or an app that translates biometric responses to certain works or experiences into data. Is it possible to measure an individual's response to art in a truly meaningful way?

Museums are constantly searching for methods to make visitor experience more enriching and engaging, and part of that process is learning what audiences want, how audiences operate in the museum, and how the museum experience is perceived by the public. Is there a new method of getting visitor feedback that hasn't been discovered and can help build on information learned through comment books, market research and interviews? What is it really like for visitors to come to the Walters? Can we expand on current methods of research such as question and answer, surveys etc -- perhaps even move beyond the…

At previous ArtBytes events, some efforts were made to collect the content of the existing mobile tour, which relies on older, rented devices. Now, the museum has a mobile website for use within the galleries, using visitors' personal devices, but that site does not include audio. For the moment it has text and images.

What might it be like to provide a variety of media, via mobile devices, within the museum galleries?

How did they do that? An interactive station next to particular objects/works of art that explain how that object/work came into being. Or, it could be an app. For example, "How did they stuff that alligator" "How was paint made used on this picture"? "How as armor made"? A person could push a key that would explain the process, perhaps ask them to make choices, as, "What do you think would be good stuffing for this alligator"? then provide a list of options. Or, "What kind of material would be good for armor?" Or, "what mineral would be good for making red paint," then offer choices. The station could also take the person to the next station, such as "Now go to the largest Buddha statue in the Asian collection to find out how it was made." These stations could provide videos of things being made, interviews with people who make them (a taxidermist, for example), and short histories of the processes. All done through earphones, so as not to disturb other patrons.

How did they do that? An interactive station next to particular objects/works of art that explain how that object/work came into being. Or, it could be an app. For example, "How did they stuff that alligator" "How was paint made used on this picture"? "How as armor made"? A person could push a key that would explain the process, perhaps ask them to make choices, as, "What do you think would be good stuffing for this alligator"? then provide a list of options. Or, "What kind of material would be good for armor?" Or, "what mineral would be good for…

The walters has a managed database of events information, and that information is published to the website at http://thewalters.org/events/ but how can this information become a more integral part of the visitor experience? Could mobile devices be used to find out what's going on at the museum? Could the events information be sent to digital signage in the lobby or auditorium? Automated tweets about each day's events? There are lots of possibilities for this rich set of data about events at the museum.

The Walters shows many movies, short-films and documentaries year round. We are looking to use one of those films (Walters did create a film featuring Vincent Price, which may work) and add 4D elements to it. 4D meaning getting the audiences' devices/phones interacting with the movie in real-time. Here's a good example of a 4D movie/short-film using audiences' devices https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R22WNkYKeo8&x-yt-ts=1422579428&x-yt-cl=85114404

Because of the size of many paintings, x-rays have to be taken in separate “plates” and then digitally stitched back together. This is useful for seeing the way an artwork is imaged for conservation preservation. Finding a less time-consuming way to digitally combine plates is a big challenge for conservators.

For Culture Crunch, area cultural institutions and teachers are coming together to create an open portal of digital interactive lessons. Participating cultural institutions, including the Walters, Maryland Science Center, National Aquarium, Maryland Historical Society, Maryland Zoo, and Irvine Nature Center, will open up their digital resources for teachers to incorporate into lessons. The result will be a portal of culturally-rich and engaging educational material for teachers and students regionally to access.

Riffing on www.placekitten.com, which is "a quick and simple service for getting pictures of kittens for use as placeholders in your designs or code." but instead of kittens use digitized works of art from our collection.

Is it possible to get an SMS service like Twilio to talk to the Walters collection API in order to allow visitors to grab additional works of art info by text message? If so, it would be great to be able to get additional info that can't fit on a wall label like artist bio, other works by the same artist that are on view, even get an MMS of the digitized artwork itself.

The idea is to engage the visitors with the artworks as much as possible. One way to achieve this goal is to provide an app for smart phones and tablets that can "scan a code" and bookmark the artist and a thumbnail (small image of the artwork) instantly. The app should also quickly download some information about that artist as well as the artwork. Ideally, the app should also play audio about the artwork or "read out loud" the text for people with special needs.

The app can also be developed as a more general system to be used by other museums which then can provide a larger portfolio about other artworks of that particular artist that can be found in nearby cities, etc.

Another function, which was also suggested by another user, is to make the app download audio files and replace the regular audio tour devices. This will definitely encourage more people to use the audio guides, not only because of the costs, but also because some people have hygiene concerns about using shared headsets.

I think museum lovers will appreciate such an app.

The idea is to engage the visitors with the artworks as much as possible. One way to achieve this goal is to provide an app for smart phones and tablets that can "scan a code" and bookmark the artist and a thumbnail (small image of the artwork) instantly. The app should also quickly download some information about that artist as well as the artwork. Ideally, the app should also play audio about the artwork or "read out loud" the text for people with special needs.

I'd like to see an app that encompasses the museum's 'works of art' site, the mobile site, audio tours, and the floor plan. This would give visitors everything they need while touring the galleries in the museum. It could be used on smart phones and tablets.

I will use a CNC router to mill out sections of the surface of the Moon in wood. The surfaces are developed directly from scientific data taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and are of ideal settlement sites on the Moon. Each contains a peak-of-eternal-light plus a permanently shadowed crater. (Google heading for additional information.)

The plaques are about 12" by 7" by 1.5" and are in American hardwood. The milling time is about 3 hours per plaque. We currently have data for three plaques, Mt. Malapert, Scott A Massif, and Crater Haworth..

Concern: The small router and vacuum cleaner are noisy. I will take some precautions to control the noise.

I will use a CNC router to mill out sections of the surface of the Moon in wood. The surfaces are developed directly from scientific data taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and are of ideal settlement sites on the Moon. Each contains a peak-of-eternal-light plus a permanently shadowed crater. (Google heading for additional information.)

The plaques are about 12" by 7" by 1.5" and are in American hardwood. The milling time is about 3 hours per plaque. We currently have data for three plaques, Mt. Malapert, Scott A Massif, and Crater Haworth..